In the late fall of 2006, 10 or so months into my first Iraq tour, I went on a series of patrols in the neighborhoods just east of Baghdad airport. Packed with squat tan houses and narrow trash-strewn streets, the area was a …

Early Monday morning, more than a dozen car bombs ripped through mostly Shi‘ite neighborhoods in Baghdad, killing at least 50 people and leaving dozens lying bloodied in the streets. The worst attack that day was in heavily …